


Hands that

by WahlBuilder



Category: The Technomancer (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Noir, Anal Sex, Blood Kink, First Time, M/M, Painplay, Party
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-01
Updated: 2019-02-01
Packaged: 2019-10-20 14:51:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17624462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WahlBuilder/pseuds/WahlBuilder
Summary: Director Viktor Watcher is bored at a party — until he sees his mark there.In Anton's opinion, there are few things as enticing as a man in a good suit. Even more enticing is that manoutof that suit.





	Hands that

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Haaska](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Haaska/gifts).



> Inspired and encouraged by Haaska, whom I dragged into this trash bin with me.

Viktor hates parties. He’s not a partying type: parties take time and energy away from other things he’d rather be doing. But when he gets an invitation, and if he is physically able to attend, he drags himself there and uses it as an opportunity to exercise self-control. His wishes and inclinations are irrelevant. What matters is his work, his duty, and parties provide opportunities to gather information, to make connections, to memorize the layout of the house if the host is careless enough to organize it in their den.

This particular party is rather boring, although he suspects other guests don’t find it so, if only for the company of the crème de la crème. He isn’t sure why he is invited, but he can make a few guesses.

Still, the band is playing something sweet and non-intrusive, he’s sipping overly sweet champagne, nobody has bothered him so far. He entertains himself with trying to recall as much dirt on each and every guest as he can.

The host, for example. Filthy rich both from her marriage to a railway baron (giving bribes) and her inheritance (taking bribes). Viktor hasn’t been formally introduced yet. She’s not particularly interesting. Her lover, however… Viktor considers the things he might say and make sure they go through the host to Mlle Dubois and to the Deuxième Bureau.

Viktor brings his glass to his lips — and heat spreads over the back of his neck.

He’s being watched.

Intensely, pointedly, _openly_.

And he knows that gaze. Just three days ago, he experienced it for the first time.

He turns, slowly, and finds _him_ instantly.

(He looks very good in dark blue that brings even more solidity to his broad figure.)

The man smiles and salutes with his glass.

The room is too hot.

Viktor turns way.

Only three days ago, that same man watched him with an expression so hungry Viktor felt like he would be torn to shreds. In his state then, having fought through a gang in a very personal way, Viktor wouldn’t have minded.

(Does he imagine it, or does that bottom lip still look slightly swollen?)

After three years of chasing each other, they have finally met face to face.

(And what a face it is! No sketches do it justice.)

Even bruised, with blood smeared over his chin and his cheekbone, the Russian looked… Good for tasting.

(The Scythes boasted that Anton had been killed by them, and Viktor almost — _almost_ — mourned.

Oh, was he glad to find it not true, and to crack some Scythes skulls for that, beating his way to Anton.)

It was just the scent of blood on Viktor’s knuckles, on Anton… It was heady. He was not entirely himself, having unleashed that _thing_ that forever claws inside.

And now, locking eyes with Anton, so neat and besuited, with a glass in his hands… It feels unreal.

“Director!”

He tries to sigh as surreptitiously as possible.

“Or is it ‘Colonel’? ‘Detective’? ‘Agent’?”

“Whatever suits you, Mrs. Falkner.” He turns to her with a smile sculpted onto his face, takes and squeezes her fingers — but his gaze falls on the host’s companion.

He knows Anton. (Mr. Rogalyov.) From the dossier sketches, a couple of photos, and now, that meeting three days ago.

(There is a mole behind Anton’s right ear, a scar just above his right brow.

Anton kissed with hunger and didn’t back away when his lips were sliced open again on Viktor’s teeth.)

Briefly, the cloying flowery perfume Mrs. Falkner wears is pushed away by the sweetness of blood.

Anton smiles. His eyes are like white and red wine mixed improperly, like a drop of blood in champagne.

“Director. It is said you are not one for small talk, so let us get straight to business.”

Everyone wants something from him. A favor, a job to be done, a job to be not done…

“My friend sings praise for you. There is a task, and a reward.”

Anton smiles wider, his eyes sharp.

Viktor smiles, too — the smile that, he knows, is utterly charming but leaves his eyes cold. Just a stretch and curve of lips. And he says, looking at Anton, _“Ça ne m'intéresse pas.”_ He salutes with his glass and drifts away.

It might cost him a contact — but the frown on Anton’s face is worth it.

He makes a few rounds and performs idle chatting procedures, shakes and kisses hands, and finally has the opportunity to fade away.

He goes out onto the balcony, blessedly empty of inebriated guests, picks an ash tray off a small table and puts it on the banister, takes off his jacket and throws it over the table. He opens his cuffs and rolls up his sleeves, takes a cigarette out of the case in his jacket, lights it and closes his eyes, reclining over the banister and taking a drag.

“It is impolite to stare,” he notes aloud.

“It was not polite,” Anton replies from behind him, “to tell a host off like that.”

Viktor taps at the cigarette. “This is a party. I’m here to have fun, not to talk business.”

“And are you having fun?” Anton comes to his side, leans on the banister sideways, looks at him.

Everyone wants something from him.

Sometimes, it’s a fuck.

He knows what his looks and certain attitude do to some people, and sometimes it is necessary to use that.

(He hates seduction.)

But… He hopes Anton isn’t here for that. That it’s not all that this would come to, the three years of chase, of trying to outsmart each other.

(Please, let it be more than that.)

He gives Anton a deliberately appraising look, then takes another drag. “Not yet.”

***

That Viktor has noticed his approach is not at all surprising. The man is always alert, even while smiling politely. Viktor is a hunter.

(He looked so good streaked with blood, eyes bright and full of the heat of the hunt and the promise of death.)

Following him to the balcony hasn’t been the greatest idea, Anton realizes when Viktor starts taking off his jacket.

(Anton cannot make himself call Viktor “Director” or “Colonel”, even in his mind.)

Viktor’s tapered waist, and long, lean legs, his arms, the breadth of his shoulders, the silk of the dark gray vest shimmering as he moves… Viktor rolls up his sleeves, lines of ink on the underside of his forearms, and then he leans over the banister and…

Viktor is playing with him. The French, now this… divestment. (His long _legs_.) The way his fingers tap on the cigarette.

Anton notices that Viktor’s left ear is pierced.

(He was too distracted by others things three days ago. Like the groan Viktor let out when Anton pulled at his short graying hair to change the angle of the kiss.)

Viktor has hidden his past well: no amount of digging brought anything substantial. But some of it is right here, in the slightly uneven line of his nose, the white spot of a scar on the angling line of his jaw, the leveled knuckles of his fists. The long lines of ink.

Anton wants him to…

Anton wants him.

The game of wits, of timing, of deals is the most challenging Anton has ever had with anyone — but uncovering the mystery of this man in person is even more challenging and rewarding.

He’s seen Viktor swept by the hunger for death, the thirst for blood — and he wants that again. Wants to tear under this sleek exterior to the depths of violence within.

(To prove that they are alike.)

Viktor has caused him more headaches than everyone else combined. Raided venues, detainments, arrests, disrupted shipments… Anton trades information with Viktor, too, sells him other groups that pose a threat or are not important.

Somehow, plain bribery instead of clever tactics seems unsportly—

(What if Viktor gets disappointed and stops the game?)

—and blackmail too blunt a weapon.

(He doesn’t want the game to end.)

To know the reality of Viktor, to have seen him, in a span of a few days, at his most violent and at his most charmingly cold is an experience that leaves Anton drunk better than any champagne.

He reaches out and slides his fingers under the back of the vest, strokes the vertebrae. “I can help with that.”

***

They stumble into the first room they find on the third floor, and Anton presses Viktor to the door immediately, biting into his mouth. Viktor has strangely sharp teeth, and they break Anton’s lips, still tender from the beating of the three days ago, but Anton doesn’t mind. Oh, he doesn’t mind at all, not for the hungry way Viktor is licking the blood off, licking into his mouth like he can find all the truths there, unformed on Anton’s tongue.

“Антон,” Viktor murmurs in between kisses.

“Что?” He starts tearing at Vik’s vest. A button rolls on the floor.

“Я портсигар оставил на балконе.”

He leans back. The light from the garden seeps into the room. There is a rumbling in Vik’s chest, and Anton realizes that this is Vik laughing.

“Да и черт с ним.” 

He kisses Vik again, just for that laughter, and scrapes his nails over the nape of Vik’s neck, up into his short hair and _pulls_ — and Vik makes that groan — or rather, he sounds like he simply can’t hold it back, can’t help himself.

He nips at Vik’s jaw, pushing the vest off his shoulders, pushing off the suspenders.

Their hands clash — Vik’s cold — as they undo Vik’s shirt buttons. They pulls the tails out of Vik’s trousers, and the shirt hangs on his shoulders, stark-white, and his flesh pale underneath, and…

“You are a walking scandal,” Anton whispers, astonished that there’s nothing underneath the shirt except for skin and muscle. “Abhorrent, abominable…”

Vik chuckles, and for that, Anton fastens his teeth on his collarbone. The chuckle breaks into another groan that comes from Vik’s very core.

Vik tastes like salt and musk.

Anton wraps an arm around Vik’s waist, just to memorize the width of him. Vik’s body, unlike his hands, is hot to the touch, as though he’s running a slight fever.

There is more ink on Vik’s chest, and Anton wishes he’d had the mind to turn the lights on… But not here.

(He wants to know they are going to have “somewhere else”, too, later.)

He presses on the back of Vik’s head to pull him into another kiss, his own lips tender, stinging. (He doesn’t mind.)

“Vik. Vitya. How do you want it?”

Vik breathes against his lips. He tastes of blood.

The whole world has faded away.

“However _you_ want it.” Vik’s hand moves over Anton’s shoulder and settles where it meets his neck, fitting there perfectly.

Anton knows it’s another bit in the game. A tangle, layers and layers…

“Turn around,” he orders. He thinks he’s read Vik right. Oh yes.

The loss of the weight of Vik’s hand on his shoulder is compensated by the sight of Vik’s back and Anton is greatly distracted from fishing a small jar out of his pocket by dark shapes under the white cotton. More ink, oh.

He scoops some jelly onto his fingers and slides his other hand under the waistband of Vik’s trousers and…

“Vitya, you are _obscene_ ,” he groans, pressing his forehead between Vik’s shoulder blades because, honestly, honestly… “Isn’t it uncomfortable? No underclothes?”

That laughter rumbles, almost inaudible — and then turns into a soft gasp when he pulls Vik’s trousers lower and strokes his hole with a slicked finger.

Vik _purrs_. “And you carry petroleum jelly to a party. Which one of us is obscene?”

He scrapes his teeth over Vik’s back, strokes himself, and then presses inside.

Vik’s groan _is_ obscene.

“Витя,” he manages, his throat straining, and strokes Vik’s hip, “сейчас весь дом сбежится.” 

Vik is so tight and _hot_ and his whole body is taut and Anton digs his fingers into his hip because he _can_ , and gets another groan as his reward.

“Плевать. Убью первого, кто— Ah fuck, move, _move_ …”

Slinging one arm across Vik’s chest (a long scar right under his fingers, and Vik’s ribs, and—), holding onto his hip, pressing his forehead to Vik’s back, he rocks into Vik, squeezing his eyes shut, the whole world filled with Vik’s low, throaty groans that vibrate in his chest.

Anton murmurs something soothing. Maybe.

The movement is rather shallow, but it is enough, and the scraping sound that Anton notices a few moments later is Vik _dragging his nails over the door_.

Anton moves, panting, stroking Vik all over, and then closes his fingers on Vik’s heavy and very hot cock and the rhythm they find is obscene.

And perfect.

***

The sky is already lit up with sunrise when Viktor staggers into the direction of his apartment.

He’s pilfered a bottle of that terrible sweet champagne from the kitchen of the Falkners’ house, getting looks and giggles from the serving boys and girls. The story, the _scandal_ of him — half of buttons on his shirt and vest gone, his jacket and pants rumpled, his overall looks disheveled — would have gotten into newspapers — but the Falkners’ butler and cook have been on his payroll for six months already. The servants wish him a good day, and he gives them half his monthly pay because he knows parties like this one are the hardest on them.

He drinks the whole of that champagne on his rather unsteady way.

His whole body is _aching_.

There are flares of pain on his hip (and a bruise in the shape of Anton’s hand), on his cracked ribs that Anton has somehow found and _pressed_ on, a hot pain somewhere in the general area of his spine where Anton bit him.

The burning in his lower parts, of course, and the strain in his thighs.

He feels thoroughly fucked — but not _dirty_.

(Not like always.)

The champagne does little to add to his heavy, warm mood and feel. He finds an alley with a trash bin and throws the bottle when a voice from behind him growls, “Hey, pal, you better— Uh.” The growl disappears. “Mr. Watcher, is that you?”

He smiles. (He doesn’t sculpt it.) “ _C'est moi_ , Mr. Knock-Down.”

“Is your _moi_ okay, Mr. Watcher?”

“Terrific.” He turns to his almost-robber. “What’re you doing jumping people in alleys again?”

The rogue squares his shoulders. He’s whip-thin and looks thirty, even though he’s three-twenty. “Money’s tight, Mr. Watcher.”

“Then we’ll do the following: you get me safely to my apartment, I make us coffee and the biggest omelet I can make from a dozen of eggs—” The rogue opens his mouth, but Viktor talks over him, fishing in his trouser pockets… Ah, there it is. “—And you tell me everything you know about this.” He holds up the ring he’s slipped off Mrs. Falkner’s fingers when he squeezed them.

“Uh. Is that the… the one involved in that trial, Mr. Watcher?”

“Uh-huh. And so I need to know how it got into certain hands while the trial is ongoing.”

They start walking. Viktor throws his jacket onto his shoulders, but doesn’t button it.

“Mr. Watcher?”

“Yes, Mr. Knock-Down?”

“Is that… That looks like a bite on your collarbone, sir.”

“It _is_ a bite.”

“Oh.”

***

They swear up and down to him that it’s not from them. At his frown, they just point at his office and only say that it is definitely not a bomb.

He walks into the office — and there is a small cigarette case.

He knows it is his, the one he left at the party, because it has a dent in the corner. (A reminder of that fight… four days ago now.)

He picks it, turns it.

And of course. Of course Anton couldn’t just leave it.

_Рука, к которой шёл бы хлыст_

_~A to V_

He smiles and puts it into his pocket.

His ribs ache and the bruises are not gone yet.

He feels _alive_.


End file.
